Such Stuff As Dreams Are Made On
by cenotaphy
Summary: What Team Free Will Dreams about. Season 11 fic.


In his nightmares, Dean dreams of Hell.

He dreams of the rack, dreams of torn skin and snapped bones, limbs stretched past their limits, organs spilling obscenely out. He dreams of being carefully, lovingly, methodically pried apart at the seams. He dreams of Alastair's expert fingers, Alastair's low crooning voice, Alastair's white teeth in the dark. He dreams of rusted blades in his gut, of iron spikes hammered through his palms, of crooked fishhooks sliding under his eyelids.

Sometimes he dreams of the moment he stepped down off the rack, the moment when Dean Winchester, the Righteous Man, picked up the knife and became less than human, worse than demon, lower than dirt. In dreams he always knows the cost, always knows about Lucifer and the Seals and the Apocalypse, and in his dreams he always steps down anyway.

* * *

In his nightmares, Sam dreams of the Cage.

The Cage, suspended in the darkness of the deepest hole of Hell, looks metal but burns like ice to the touch. No light travels through the small gaps between the bars. Solid, unyielding, cruel, it was meant to contain an archangel.

It was never meant to contain two archangels.

Michael and Lucifer, raging, fill the cage with the tumult of their presence. They rip Sam out of his skin, flay him raw and leave him to burn in a sea of celestial fire. When they turn on each other, their mingled grace beats against the confines of their prison, flattens Sam against the frigid touch of the bars. Their fury leaves no room for anything else. Alone, Sam curls blinded and deafened in a corner and hopes that they never remember him.

* * *

In his nightmares, Castiel dreams of Heaven.

He is in a space between spaces, newly torn from his vessel and fighting still, while the merciless voice of the Host hammers him into the floor. He is arching his back in the chambers of correction, as his wings are made corporeal so that the bones may be broken one by one. He is in the dark and dirty depths of Heaven where Zachariah asks him, in between cuts, whether he is ready to obey. He is strapped to Naomi's chair, as she slides a needle into his eye and excises everything that he tried to choose to be.

* * *

Dean's nightmares are of blood and bone.

The demons of Hell enjoy their craft. They carve Dean away from his skeleton, slice pieces off and show them to him while he still has his eyes. And always there is Alastair. When he is not cutting he is watching, mocking, murmuring. The demons of Hell might enjoy their craft but their work is nothing compared to one minute with Alastair.

Dean begs. Years in the Pit make dignity meaningless. Dean screams, he cries, he curses and pleads. Alastair laughs and lifts his bloodied hands out of the tangle of viscera so that he can ruffle Dean's hair.

Sometimes, at the end of the day, the demon who comes to heal him wears Sam's face. It happens often enough that Dean should know better, but somehow there are still days when he is fooled. Days when he sees the mussed bangs and hazel eyes and he believes. Sam presses his fingertips to what remains of Dean's face, and Dean is whole. With his new tongue and new lips, Dean slurs, "Sammy," and the demon wearing Sam's face chooses that moment to gut him.

Dean steps off the rack, buys himself a respite with the coins of his soul. He cuts and cuts, losing a little more of himself with every day that he is free of pain. He learns to take pleasure in the work. But holding the knife still reminds him of being the one under it, and so he learns to hack a little deeper, be a little crueler, in order to forget the fear.

* * *

Sam's nightmares are of shadow and fire. The Cage erupts in flame and light when Lucifer and Michael slam into each other, but goes pitch-black and silent as they pull free. In the brief interlude that follows, Lucifer slithers down to the floor of the Cage where Sam shakes and shivers in the dark. _I haven't forgotten about you, Sam._

Sam tries to be brave, because Dean would have been brave.

Lucifer hisses, _I haven't forgotten whose fault it is that I am here._

He pries open Sam's mouth with a thought and flows inside, a torrent of shadow, barreling down Sam's throat, deep into his chest, snapping ribs as he goes. Sam chokes on the heat of Lucifer's tainted grace as the fallen angel flays his lungs, splinters his spine, crushes his heart in one hand.

 _I will get out of here again, eventually_ , says Lucifer, coiled up inside Sam's torso, his touch corroding through organs and muscle. _I will get out, and I will kill everyone you love, and then I will kill everyone else._

 _But you, Sam?_ says Lucifer, shouting now, over the roar of fire that accompanies Michael's approach.

 _You're going to be here forever,_ he says, before Michael punches through Sam's stomach and rips the Devil out.

* * *

Castiel's nightmare's are of metal and light.

He dreams of the painful brilliance of the Host, of the silver blades held to his throat while his brothers carve sigils of punishment and disgrace into his skin. He dreams of his own weapon held high, glinting with intent in some shadowy illusion of a warehouse before he plunges it into Dean's chest. He dreams of steel cuffs around his wrists as Metatron drains the life out of him, the agony of it, the sick feeling of nausea as the shimmering trickle of his grace is siphoned away.

Castiel tries to scream, but cannot.

* * *

In his nightmares, Dean watches the people he loves die. Sam falls to his knees in the mud at Cold Oak. Jo presses a hand to her stomach to hold her intestines in. Bobby flatlines on a hospital bed. Cas walks into the river and never looks back.

They die and he is alone. They die and it terrifies him. They die and Dean, terrified, watches as if from outside of himself as his eyes turn tar-black. There is blood on his hands. There is always blood on his hands. Clutched in his trembling fingers, the jagged blade of bone thrums.

 _They don't need you_ , Azazel snarls in his father's voice. _Not like you need them._

* * *

In his nightmares, Sam lets down the people he loves. His hands wrap around Dean's throat in that room filled with shattered glass and broken trust. His palm chars the brain of Kevin Tran to ashes. His skin shrinks back from the heat of the flames erupting around Jess's body.

Lucifer bursts through the cracked skin of the unwitting earth, and it is his fault.

Cas writhes red-eyed on the floor in the throes of Rowena's curse, and it is his fault.

Charlie is curled like a small fragile thing in a motel bathroom, and it is his fault.

Dean fights for his life for over a year in Purgatory, and it is his fault.

* * *

In his nightmares, there are no people whom Castiel loves, and none who love him.

 _Loyalty_ , murmurs Lucifer. _Such a nice quality to see this day and age_. He leaves the question unspoken, but it bares itself in the cold mockery of his smile: _do you really think your loyalty is returned?_

 _Angels were not meant to feel_ , comes the searing whisper of the Host. Sam and Dean do not exist in this silvery space between spaces. Alone, Castiel tries to feel. The cold wind of the Host rebuffs him. _To love is not for you._

 _How long do you think you would have lasted, before the Winchesters realized you were broken?_ says Naomi as she unmakes him. _How long before they realized and threw you away?_

Cas gives up everything he is, on the floor of Heaven as the Host rebuilds him into a soldier. Later, he gives up everything he is, because Dean Winchester asks it of him. Later, he gives up everything he is, because he believes it is the only way, but on the other side of the holy fire he sees Sam and Dean turn their backs. Later, he gives up everything he is because Naomi wrenches it from him, and so Dean dies again and again, and again and again, not by Castiel's choice, but by Castiel's hand all the same.

 _I won't hurt Dean._

 _You will. You are._

 _I won't give you Sam and Dean._

 _You don't have a choice._

 _Family_ , says Dean ( _you can't stay_ ), and _obey_ , says the Host ( _you have fallen in every imaginable way_ ), and _I fixed you_ , says Naomi ( _us or them_ ), and so Castiel gives and gives until he is nothing, and in his nightmares he finally discovers the truth: that there is no one, on Heaven or Earth, who wants an angel that is nothing.

* * *

Sam and Dean and Castiel dream of Heaven and Hell and Earth and each other, and in their nightmares they are always alone.


End file.
